Category Archives: Mexicanos en Exilio

Taylor Levy worked for three years as a full-time volunteer at Annunciation House, a migrant house of hospitality located eleven blocks from the U.S.-Mexico border, and continues to volunteer with the organization. In April 2014, she became a Fully Accredited Representative in front of the Board of Immigration Appeals and currently works at Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center representing low-income immigrant clients. She can be reached at taylorklevy@gmail.com

Ideally, each and every migrant who seeks political asylum in the U.S. would be judged equally and impartially regardless of country of origin; however, this is simply not the case. Mexican applicants consistently face exceptionally low asylum grant rates despite widespread human rights abuses and levels of violence that often rival those found in active war zones.

During the period from FY2009 to FY2013, immigration courts received a total of 186,556 asylum applications from respondents of all nationalities (DOJ, 2014). In turn, immigration judges decided a total of 92,915 asylum cases “on the merits” (meaning that the asylum application was followed through to the end and was either granted or denied). Of that figure, asylum was granted in 48,099 cases, representing overall average grant rate of 52%. For FY2013, the top ten nationalities granted asylum by immigration courts were China, Ethiopia, Nepal, India, Egypt, the Soviet Union, Eritrea, Russia, El Salvador, and, for the first time ever, Mexico (DOJ, 2013).

Despite finally breaking into the top ten, however, Mexican asylum applicants continued to face significant adjudication disparities with grants rates far below the 52% grant rate for all nationalities combined. For example, from FY2009 to FY2013, Mexican applicants only had a 9% chance of being granted political asylum by an immigration judge, while Chinese applicants were successful over 74% of the time (DOJ, 2014). Likewise, on average, Colombians were granted asylum by immigration judges more than 40% of the time.

As demonstrated by these statistics, Mexican asylum applicants consistently face exceptionally low grant rates despite the high levels of violence and political terror occurring in Mexico today. There are a number of alternate explanations for why Mexican applicants do not receive asylum at the same (or even similar) rate as applicants coming from other nations. The most frequently cited argument made by government officials attributes these disparities to disproportionally high rates of frivolous asylum claims being filed by Mexican nationals. While not without its merits, this simplistic explanation fails to fully explain the extent to which Mexican applicants are negatively favored within the U.S. political asylum bureaucracy.

On the other hand, several scholars have argued that the U.S. is reluctant to grant Mexicans asylum “out of fear of economic burden,” general anti-Latino/a sentiment, the geographic proximity of Mexico, and worries that granting asylum to Mexican nationals would open the symbolic floodgates of legalized Mexican immigration to the U.S (Evans & Kohrt, 2004, p.18; Mann, 2012; Morales et. al. 2013). Furthermore, low asylum grant rates for Mexican nationals likely reflect U.S. government worries that granting asylum on a large scale would negatively affect foreign relations ties between the U.S. and Mexico (Plascencia, 2000). Since political asylum is granted on the basis of persecution by the government or by groups that the government cannot control, widespread granting of asylum for Mexican nationals could raise issues concerning the ethics of the U.S. government providing millions of dollars of aid to the Mexican military while at the same time granting political asylum to refugees fleeing the human rights abuses of that very same military organization.

It is clear that political biases have resulted in the unfair treatment of Mexican asylum seekers despite moral and legal obligations to protect refugees for whom deportation is a death sentence. The U.S. government must provide refuge to the thousands of Mexicans who have been persecuted and displaced due to extreme levels of violence, corruption, and lawlessness within their country. Furthermore, the U.S. government must ensure that these arriving refugees are treated fairly and humanely, without being subjected to further persecution and trauma. Contemporary Mexican asylum seekers are not “gaming the system;” they are fleeing for their lives, and the U.S. government must treat them accordingly.

Note: There is no explanation of the use of the “Soviet Union” as a country.
Adapted from Department of Justice (DOJ), Executive Office of Immigration Review (EOIR).
(2014b, April). FY 2013 Statistical Yearbook. Retrieved April 25, 2014
from http://www.justice.gov/eoir/statspub/fy13syb.pdf

Mexican photojournalist Julian Cardona presented his photographs illustrating the violence in Mexico and the economic turmoil its citizens face during his visit to California State University, Northridge on Tuesday, April 11.

Sharing photographs from his books including Exodus/Exodo and Juarez: The Laboratory of our Future, Cardona noted the ramifications of North American Free Trade Act (NAFTA), an agreement among the US, Mexico and Canada, and the risks migrants face when crossing the border.

“First thing I realized was that in the city there were external forces and transnational forces that were playing a role in the everyday life,” said Cardona.

As a photographer for El Diario de Juarez, he witnessed first hand the effects of foreign markets in Mexico, noting the privatization of the public enterprise and market de-regularization.

A series of events will be held in Austin, March 26-29 regarding political
asylum for Mexicans fleeing the violence.
Details are available at the Mexicanos en Exilio Facebook page and in the
attached flyer. An outline of the scheduled events is below.

See the attached profile of Carlos Spector and his political asylum
practice in the current issue of the Texas Observer. This is a companion
piece to the story about the hyperviolence in the Valle de Juarez that was
posted last week. That story is online here:

Below is the posting from Frontera List on April 8 2011 with the
original Diario article that I believe describes the event that caused
Christina Roman to leave Juarez and seek asylum in the US. Kudos to
the Spector law firm and others in the area who are working to help
those seeking asylum from the criminal and government-sponsored
violence in Mexico. For information on how you can help these
refugees, see:

http://mexicanosenexilio.com/mexilio_welcome.html
Mexicanos En Exilio
Mexicanos En Exilio (Mexicans in Exile), founded by the Law Offices of
Carlos Spector, is a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping those
forced to leave Mexico because of the Mexican government’s failure or
unwillingness to protect them. These individuals have risked their
lives for truth and justice in Mexico. These individuals include
reporters, photo journalists, political activists, human rights
activists, businessmen, and former members of law enforcement.

Diario presents an interview with a survivor of the massacre at the
bar El Castillo last week where 10 people were killed. She is a woman
who worked at the bar. Before the attack, some federal police entered
the bar and started searching some of the clients. They also took away
their cell phones. The witness says one of her coworkers argued with
the police, asking them why they were molesting the clients and the
workers. She was warned, “You will be the first…”
The police left and shortly afterward, a single gunman described as a
young man of about 20 with an assault rifle–a sicario– entered the
bar and committed the killings. Among the victims was the young woman
who had talked to the police as well as the owner of the bar. He had
previously run the La Pantera bar in the same part of town and it had
been attacked for not paying protection money earlier.

The witness also said that after the killings, the federales returned,
robbed the dead of personal belongings and took other things from the
bar–bottles of imported liquor, furnishings, etc. And the report
from the Fiscalia said that the clothing on the bodies of the victims
had some of the pockets turned inside out …

The witness said that no one had denounced the behavior of the federal
agents; the owner of the bar was dead and the relatives who came to
the scene were concerned over the condition of their family members.
In this testimony she says that “supposedly they (the federal police)
are here to protect us, but it isn’t like that.”
There have been no advances in this homicide investigation. The crime
scene was completely manipulated by federal agents who took away
evidence and moved the bodies.
There is more… I posted a google translation below…

There are several video clips at the link below to the press conference announcing the grant of political asylum to Saúl Reyes. In one clip is a statement from Jorge Luis Reyes, the son of two family members kidnapped and murdered last year. The main video clip features Sara Salazar speaking about how the killings of her sons and daughters. “I had 10 children and only four remain alive, they have killed them all, and I can’t do anything… my heart is dry, I don’t have any more strength to do anything else”, said Doña Sara Salazar.